


Prends le temps d'aimer les choses simples de la vie

by GreenAppleSause



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anyone heard of Great Raft Spiders before? No? Well they're a feature in this, Archivist!Jon, Beholding!Basira, Everyone Is Alive, Everyone is an Avatar, Gen, Georgie is a clingy drunk, Georgie sleeps like the literal dead, Georgie takes everyone but Jon out for drinks, Hunt!Daisy, Jon is the DD, Martin vs The Admiral, Maybe - Freeform, Sharing a Bed, Slaughter!Melanie, Spiral!Sasha, Spoilers up to Episode 130, Stranger!Tim, Tags May Change, The End!Georgie, Tim Sasha Basira and Daisy are just mentioned in this, To Be Continued, Web!Martin, failed attempt at a cuddle pile, not really - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-03-20
Packaged: 2019-11-25 23:47:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18173057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenAppleSause/pseuds/GreenAppleSause
Summary: Georgie takes everyone out for drinks without Jon, as a break from their Eldritch and mortal bosses.Melanie refuses to take her and Martin home and calls Jon to get them.(Don't feel intimidated by the French title, this is entirely in English)





	Prends le temps d'aimer les choses simples de la vie

**Author's Note:**

> This was completely self indulgent "Everyone Lives And Is An Avatar"  
> I may add more chapters if I feel I can go anywhere with this.
> 
> As for the title, it is a lyric from Run Run by Indila, and it translates to 'take the time to enjoy the simple things in life'.  
> I recommend the [song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv5bB40Rxsg) to anyone who feels like it.
> 
> Also, for a little fun fact, I wrote this in my state library, which also happens to be how I always imagine the Institute, which you can see [here](https://twitter.com/greenapplecos/status/1108217960873627648).

If there was one thing Melanie wished she could have taken from Elias - other than his life - was the fucker’s ability to see shit about the future.

If she’d had that, she wouldn’t be in a pub, dealing with a drunken Martin and Georgie.

If she was being honest, she knows she should have expected how well they got along - one was Jon’s ex and best friend outside the Archives, and the other was Jon’s current pursuer and best friend in the Archives.

Even so, Melanie really did _not_ want to be the one to get them home, and Basira has left with a very drunk Daisy hours ago. Tim and Sasha were elsewhere in the pub, not that Melanie was going to go find them. She… didn’t want to see whatever the claims of The Spiral and The Stranger were up to.

Almost everyone attached to the Archives had been dealing with their own Eldritch fear god, other than The Beholding, and had honestly just decided that they needed a night off. Georgie took the initiative in getting them all out, talking Jon into cat sitting The Admiral so that she would be able to take everyone out for drinks to calm down.

But now, watching her and Martin attempt to climb on a table and demand a karaoke stage be set up, Melanie really wanted to be _anywhere_ else, but someone had to stop the newest claims of The End and The Web from making this pub a mess.

Tired and feeling her attachment to The Slaughter straining, she called Jon.

‘Melanie, it’s two in the morning.’

‘And we both know you’re awake, reading you fourth? Fifth? Statement of the night. Now if you wouldn’t mind picking up your drunken friends. I’m not going to take care of them, Basira and Daisy left hours ago, and only your Eye bullshit knows where Sasha and Tim went. I want to go home, sleep, and _possibly_ think about murdering half the people in this pub.’

Melanie could hear Jon grumble something, and thought she heard the words “damn”, “learn”, and “again”, which she assumed were about Georgie’s university days. After a few minutes of grumbling, Jon sighed.

‘Tell my why they can’t just go sleep in the Archives?’

‘You really want The Web and The End, _drunk_ , in your Archives?’ Melanie countered, knowing that, despite it being the closer and far easier option, he would never allow anyone drunk in his Archives, let alone two other powers.

Another sigh. ‘I’ll be there in twenty.’

* * *

Jon, ever so reluctantly, lifted The Admiral from his lap, reaching for the car keys. He should have known that this was were the night would end. No, he _did_ know this was where the night would end, but he had hoped against hope that he was wrong. And yet, here we was, about to drive for the first time in years.

He never really understood why Georgie drove, or why she had insisted on teaching him to drive in university. Or, he didn’t, until he learnt what a menace to society Georgie was when she drank. People simply found it easier to call one of her sober friends to come drive her home than to let her loose on public transport or to let her walk the streets.

Jon had been the designated driver for Georgie enough times to know what to expect from her. Martin, however, was a wildcard. He had never actually seen what Martin was like drunk, all he did know was that he and Georgie got on like a house on fire when sober, and in the past, that made for a disastrous carpool after the pub.

After finally making it to the pub, seeing Melanie, irritated, by the door, the loud yells of a drunken Georgie and the off tune singing of Martin coming from behind her.

‘They’re your problem now,’ she said, turning and walking towards her bus stop.

Jon looked down, breathing deeply before stepping foot in the pub. ‘When _haven’t_ they been my problem?’ he asked himself.

As soon as he walked in, Jon was practically pounced upon by the two drunken avatars, all smiles and clinging limbs - seemingly more limbs than there should have been - he only counted the four arms and a leg before Georgie decided to get grabby.

‘Georgie, that’s my ear, can you stop pulling it?’

She didn’t.

It took awhile for Jon to maneuver himself back to the car, given that Martin was definitely clinging to him and _definitely_ had more limbs than normal, and Georgie seemed to be alternatively losing feeling in her legs and collapsing every metre or so. Once he did get the two of them in the car things became easier. Detaching Martin was a struggle, but after threatening to burn his webs he let go, leaving only a few strands of silk in Jon’s hair. Georgie was fine once she fell asleep on the backseat. At least, Jon assumed she was sleeping, he could never because due to the usual seeming lack of life.

The short drive felt far too quiet, leaving far too much room for thoughts. Thoughts of every time Jon had almost lost one of them. It had been far too often, far too close. If it hadn’t been for The Distortion - he wasn’t sure if it had been Michael or Helen - Sasha would be gone forever. Tim had barely been able to make it out of The Unknowing, and definitely wouldn’t have if he hadn’t given himself to The Stranger as a new foundation for their next try. Melanie had only been shot in India because she was already growing into The Slaughter, removing the bullet only allowed her to control her decline into its hold. Daisy was always destined for The Hunt, but he never lost Basira, she was part of The Beholding as much as him, however she was always following Daisy, even just to be a bit of clarity mid Hunt. And Martin…

Jon didn’t like thinking about how he lost Martin to The Web. He doesn’t want to think about how he almost lost him to The Lonely. He _doesn’t_ think about how close he originally was to losing him to The Corruption.

When it came to Martin, Jon prefered to not think.

It took him far too long to get Martin out of the car as he was muttering something about something eating him. It was far easier to get Georgie out after detaching the spider from him, as she was practically a corpse when she was asleep. She actually might have been, but that wasn’t something to dwell on.

He returned to see Martin and The Admiral in a standoff. Maybe it should have been expected, The Admiral ate the spiders around the house when Georgie didn’t get to them, and Jon always made sure to not tell her.

‘Martin, you need to go to bed, he won’t eat you.’ Jon tried not to look too closely at Martin. He’d witnessed what Martin looked like when he got all “spider-y” as Tim had put it. Out the corner of his eye, he could see the cream starting to make its way into his hair, and he definitely had more eyes than he was meant to.

Jon didn’t want to see Martin like that again.

‘Wanna snuggle the spider,’ was a drunken mumble from Georgie’s form, reaching her grabby hands out to Martin. ‘Spider isn’t for nibbles, sir.’

Jon saw the cream in Martin’s hair fade as he turned to Georgie’s room. He knew that Martin has come over to hang out with Georgie on occasion, but he can’t remember how he knows that.

Martin, not so gently, took Georgie from Jon and put her in bed, then attempted to drag him in with them.

‘Don’t bother, spider, he doesn’t like to cuddle that much,’ Georgie muttered into her pillow, tugging Martin’s arm to pull him into her arms and bed.

As soon as the two passed out, Jon tucked the two of them in, closing the door behind him so that The Admiral wouldn’t make an attempt to eat Martin in his sleep. He carried said cat with him into the guest room that he had taken up a semi-permanent residence in.

Jon had become grateful to the two people in the room over, without them he feared he would have become the monster that Gertrude had become, sacrificing his assistants to rituals. He had, in a way, mostly with Tim, and with Sasha in a sense.

Melanie was never destined for The Beholding like Basira had been, and Daisy was always a hunter. In a way, Martin was like them - he was just claimed by what always had a claim over him.

Martin becoming part of the Web shouldn’t have surprised Jon as much as it had at the time. He had always been the one to take care of spiders, he was clever, and when he thought back on it, the two Web artifacts had been delivered to Martin despite them be addressed to Jon. Even when The Web gave him the tape about The Flesh to help him get Daisy out of the coffin, it was so that she could remove Peter Lukas and release Martin from The Lonely’s grasp.

Jon thought that if it had been anyone else Lukas had taken, they wouldn’t have been able to be saved from The Lonely.

He wondered how Elias didn’t know that Martin was The Web’s. He had known about Melanie and Daisy. He knew that Basira and Jon we’re The Beholding’s. Tim and Sasha had been circumstantial, like Michael had been. He had even known about Jon’s brush with The Web.

Maybe he did know. Maybe he just didn’t think he was anywhere near as important as he was. Maybe there was some unspoken agreement between The Beholding and The Web that let him in.

Falling asleep to those thoughts was distressing, but had been some of the calmest last thoughts Jon had had in months.


End file.
